How not to travel : Volume one

A brief trawl through any internet search engine will find you a glut of information on how to travel. Some of it will be professionally written, some of it will be intelectually stimulating, some of it will be practically useful, and even more of it, like this particular passage, will be the mad ramblings of a half-deranged holiday-maker labouring under the false delusion that anybody cares a slugs fart what they think about the world at large. What the great majority of these millions of words will not be however, is a lucid account of what you should not do whilst away from your native soil. A practical guide to avoiding the many pitfalls of the naïve, the gullible, the unlucky and the just plain stupid traveller.

First up, make sure you are not trying to travel on a damaged passport. This might sound obvious, but you would be surprised how many people think they can bluff their way through immigration in some South American country with a passport that looks like a yak has shat on it, only to find out that they need to have it replaced on an emergency same-day service at a cost of £1,247 plus travel card and valium. These are usually the same people who have a hissy fit when they are wordlessly handed a piece of paper telling them that their damaged passport has been considered a national security risk and whisked off to the nearest incinerator to be blasted into oblivion, along with all those much prized visas and immigration stamps they had collected for the last 7 years.

Secondly, don't leave your passport replacement so late that you end up having to fight your way through London rush hour to get your bags, then rely on the kindness of your friends to whisk you straight to Heathrow airport so you don't miss your flight. When you try to pack your case in 7 minutes you will forget half the things you need and take twice the crap you don't need.

Third in our really useful list is that if you are dashing hell for leather to the airport to catch a Varig flight to Rio De Janeiro via Sao Paulo, make sure this flight hasn't been cancelled. When you run breathlessly to the check-in desk only to be told that the plane you are supposed to be flying on is still in Brazil, you will probably have some kind of minor mental breakdown and start giggling maniacally at the check-in attendant. More likely than not, the next thing you will do is think back on the previous crappy 48 hours and look for a puppy to kick.

Next up, if your airline packs you all off to a local hotel for the night, you'll probably want to make sure the hotel isn't being managed by some kind of thoughtless idiot. How will you know if he is an idiot ? Easy, he will probably do something like wait for all the passengers to form orderley queues at the reception desk, then he'll take a big box of room keys from behind reception and start walking to the opposite side of the lobby with them. As he's walking across the lobby he may very well say something like the airline has made a mistake sending you all there and that they do not have enough rooms for everybody and that several dozen of you will have to make your way back to the airport. After telling you this, the mindless tosser will ask you to form an orderly queue in front of him and wait to see if you get a room. He will have no idea why this will instigate a stampede and near riot.

If you have ordered foreign currency online, for collection at the airport on departure, under no circumstances should you enter an incorrect expiry date for your credit card. This will only void your entire transaction and the smiley lady at the Travelex counter will just stare at you sympathetically, but adamantly refuse to give you those thousands of dollars at the vastly superior exchange rate you originally hoped to enjoy. You will be forced to buy your cash at backstreet loanshark prices.

When you arrive in Rio De Janeiro, make sure your luggage has travelled to the same country as you. If, for example, you were to sit at the luggage carousel until every other passenger on your flight has taken their bag and left the airport, and you still have no rucksack when the baggage handlers switch off the conveyor and come out to where you are still sitting to smoke cigarettes with the security people and have a good laugh at you, then your bag is probably still in London. Don't get too concerned about the apparently unexplainable disappearence of your entire worldly belongings, though. Chances are they will turn up after 3 days and you will only have to wear the same travel clothes in the searing tropical heat for 5 consecutive days.

Finally, don't wait until you are on the opposite side of the world before both you and your girlfriend contract a nasty bout of some flu-like lurgey. You will find that having to travel cross country on rickety public transport is not best undertaken with a fever in the low hundreds and nothing to eat for 4 days. Also the raging sore throat, continually streaming nose and hacking cough will not make you especially popular the night you have to spend in the dormitory of a hostel.

If you decide to treat yourself to a few days relaxing in an unspoiled beach paradise to make up for a fairly shitty start to your trip. Make sure the place you are visiting, Buzios in Brazil for example, isn't in the middle of a 6 day, non-stop, torrential storm that will have you wandering the nearly empty streets in boots, fleeces and raincoats.

Finally, if you decide not to bother prearranging any accommodation before arriving in a large city like Buenos Aires, please do try and ensure it is not during large-scale political demonstrations when every hostel and hotel in the entire city is booked up for the day you arrive. You will only have to cart yourself and your luggage around the sweltering city for hours desperately trying to find a bed for the night. Your sense of frustration will only be exacerbated by the fact you will have just stepped off a 16 hour bus journey with almost no sleep and all you want to do is lie down for a few hours.

So there you go. Avoid these obvious pitfalls and you too can enjoy weeks of trouble free travelling with nothing to distract you from the glorious delights that your chosen destination has to offer. Tune in next week for an update on our 'How to find the world's hardest bed' competition.


Mik ´Of course I know what I´m doing´Threlfall

And finally.....

...we have finished updating the Asia part of our journey. All photos can be found as before at http://www.flickr.com/photos/ourtravels/. We will of course soon be starting our updates from South America. All I can say for now is that Brazil is very wet!
Cara x

Singapore : Futurama on steroids

Cara on phone : "Hello, can we book 2 tickets for tomorrow's coach to Singapore please ?"
Operator : "I'm sorry, but all our coaches are fully booked for tomorrow."
Cara : "Your website says you have free seats for the 8am departure."
Operator : "Yes, we have 6 seats available on that coach."
Cara : "Oh right, can I book two seats then please ?"
Operator : "I'm sorry, but we cannot take bookings over the phone. You will need to book them via our website."
Cara : "We've been trying to do that for 2 hours and it keeps crashing on us before we can complete the booking."
Operator : "Well you can come down to our offices and we can book the tickets for you."
So we jump into a cab and race round to there offices in downtown Kuala Lumpur.
Cara : "Hi, I'd like to book two tickets for tomorrow's 8am departure to Singapore please."
Operator : "I'm sorry but all our coaches are fully booked for tomorrow."
Cara : "Oh right. But I spoke to you on the phone 10 minutes ago and you told me there were 6 seats still available."
Operator : "That's right. We have 6 seats available on the 8am departure."
Cara : "Okay, so can I book two of them please ?"
Operator : "I'm sorry, but you will need to book them via our website."
Cara : "Really ? You told me on the phone I could book them here, as your website isn't working."
Operator : "That's right. I can book them for you here."
Cara : "Excellent. Can I book two then please ?"
Operator : "Certainly, madam. That'll be 420 Ringit, please ?"
Cara : "Excuse me ? Your website says it's only 70 ringits per person."
Operator : "That's right. 6 tickets at 70 ringit per person comes to 420 ringit."
Cara : "But I only want 2 tickets."
Operator : "Oh, but you just mentioned 6 tickets."
Cara : "No, I said you told me there were 6 tickets still available."
Operator : "That's right. We have 6 tickets available on the 8am departure."
Cara : "So can I book 2 tickets please ?"
Operator : "Certainly madam. For which departure time ?"

…and so this went on for what felt like hours. We had spent half of our budget on internet cafes, telephone calls and cabs, and all to book two bloody bus tickets. To be fair, the coaches themselves were fantastic. It was just the teensiest bit more comfortable than most of the bus journeys we have taken. Seating was 3 abreast on the upper deck of a double decker with each seat being a large, reclining, leather armchair, and even I had enough legroom (almost). The following morning at the stroke of 8am, off we went down the main highway towards the border. 4 hours later and through Malaysian border control, we crossed the very long bridge which constitutes the official border crossing and into Singapore. Being officious, efficient Singapore, we had to collect all our bags off the bus and go through immigration and customs on foot. Of course they don't provide luggage trolleys ! Whilst putting our bags through the X-ray machine, we noticed the guy in front of us was getting a bit of a grilling by one of the officials. Having a quirky legal system, there is no permitted duty free allowance between Singapore and Malaysia on their land borders. Arrive by plane or boat and you're fine. Arrive by bus and you're screwed ! This guy had the audacity to try and bring one, yes one, bottle of wine through customs. The 'smuggler' was attempting to explain to the official that he travelled between the two countries all the time and had never been pulled up for the odd bottle of wine before. What he thought he was saying was : I do this all the time and nobody has told me I can't. What the official, who looked like he exited the womb on time and by the rule book, was hearing however was : I smuggle things into Singapore all the time ! The businessman continued to protest his innocence but it was no good. As the customs official held up the offending bottle of wine in much the same way as he would handle a large bag of illicit drugs, you could tell he was already mentally putting on his rubber glove. If the couple immediately behind them were watching this unfold whilst there bags passed through an X-ray machine, and desperately trying not to look like they were smuggling 114 pirated DVD's across the border, I imagine they might have been getting a little nervous at this point. I imagine they would have also considered themselves very lucky if they managed to walk through without so much as a raised eyebrow just as the 'wine smuggler' was being dragged off to a side room.

Once back on the coach, we carried on into central Singapore city where we were met by my friend Rob. He took us by taxi back to his apartment in a nice, old colonial building, down a very funky side road near Chinatown (How can you have a chinatown district in a country where 77% of the population are chinese ? That's like having Cockneytown off Leicester Square). As soon as we arrived, we dropped our bags and darted straight out of the door again. Rob was flying back to Malaysia that afternoon on business so we only had a few hours to get lunch and a few beers before he had to shoot off to the airport. So Rob, his girlfriend Rina, Cara and I spent the afternoon in the bars of Boat Quay. A bit touristy but it was great to be able to drink draught guiness again. However at £15 for 2 pints and 2 halves it was a bit of a shock to be back in the real world once more. Fortunately for Cara and me, Rob was letting us stay at his apartment while he was away so we saved a fortune on hotels, which we put to good use in the food courts and bars of the city.

I don't imagine you'll be reading this in any tourist pamphlet, but one of the greatest thrills of staying in Singapore was that we were able to use a real washing machine and have clean clothes again. This might not sound like much to many of you, but anybody who's spent time on the road will know that not having to apply the 'smell test' to what you wear can be quite a giddy experience (not to be confused with the 'smell test' itself, which will just make you dizzy !) So, most of our first full day in Singapore was spent doing laundry. Not particularly exotic, but quite necessary ! Cara was starting to give off fumes and I was attracting flies. It's staggering what a really clean pair of pants can do for your state of mind. Once done with domesticity, it was time to pound the pavements again and explore the city. Obviously, when I say explore I mean go shopping. Cara wanted to hit the clothes shops again and I had discovered that Singapore had an entire 6 floor shopping centre devoted entirely to gadgets. I was in heaven !

One of my favourite aspects of Singaporean life is that they have more places to eat than they have people to eat there. Every road seems to have a food court, which is essentially a large collection of food stalls under one roof, as well as a trillion restaurants and take-aways. It seems like you could eat in a different place every meal for years without ever visiting the same place twice. Needless to say we ate. Continuously. Cara favoured the barbequed stingray but the Singaporean laksa with raw cockles had to be my top choice.

Singaporeans' attitude to climate control is an interesting one. They don't have air-conditioning, they have refrigeration ! Taxis, shops, restaurants and underground stations are all blasted with a stream of air cold enough to make you look like you're smuggling tic-tacs up your shirt. Singapore is the only place I've ever been to where you can sweat and see your own breath at the same time. It was also nice not to have to haggle for everything any more. The downside of this however is that everything in Singapore costs much more than anything we ever haggled for elsewhere, with the possible exception of taxis. Singaporean taxi drivers are the only exception to rule 13 in our Rules list below, as they are far more likely to tell you about the best places to eat than they are of ripping you off. Some people believe the Singaporeans are a naturally polite, law abiding bunch but I happen to think the fact you can be shot for chewing gum might have something to do with it. They apply the death penalty to everything from drug smuggling to wearing flares, and even farting in public can land you with some pretty serious jail time.

One of the places Rob recommended we visit during our stay was a bar on the 70th floor of the Swissotel. He reckoned it had amazing views of the city and was THE place to have a drink and see the sunset. What's more, happy hour was from 4pm - 9pm so even scruffy plebs like us could afford a few drinks. On the downside, they had a dress code and my uniform of shorts and flip-flops was not welcome. Cara had a new dress she'd acquired that very afternoon, and she did look fantastic in it until she stood next to me ! The only things I could find to get me through the door was a pair of hiking boots that had last been worn on a muddy mountainside (and still had half of it stuck to them), and a pair of skanky combats with zip off legs. Nice ! So off we set. Cara looking like a party girl and me looking like a scarecrow. We took the lift and shot up to the 70th floor, only to find there were actually 2 bars and a restaurant there. Bugger ! We looked into one but it was packed with after-workers and didn't offer much of a view of the sunset, so we moved to the other bar. It was almost empty but the far wall was built entirely from glass and the view was incredible. It all looked a bit posh and I stuck out like a sore rhinoceros, but Cara charmed us a good table. We settled into a couple of armchairs right in front of the window and browsed the cocktail menu. The price list looked like the blackboard in a physics laboratory but they were half price during happy hour so what the hell. Cara ordered a silly double entendre and I had something effeminate. The waitress called me "sir" and pretended not to notice my muddy shoes, so I knew we were somewhere posh. We spent the next hour or so watching the sun set over the harbour and the skyscrapers light up. Singapore is a city of high-rises and it looks at its best at night. We took a few cheesy, touristy photos and asked for the bill. It was at this point that we realised the bar we were in was not the bar with the happy hour, and that the price list had not included service or government tax. Priceless ! Our 3 drinks cost us the same as 8 night's accommodation had cost us on Koh Phagnan. Was it worth it ? Well actually yes, it was. How often do you get to drink on the 70th floor of a skyscraper ? Especially after you just spent a month living in bamboo huts. And to be quite honest with you, being a skinflint gets pretty tiresome after a while.

We didn't get a huge amount of sight-seeing done as we spent half our time in the shopping centres and the other half in the food courts. I spent hundreds of pounds on electrical gadgets I don't need, Cara filled her bags with more clothes and Rina showed us where to find the best food stalls. I had a stinking cold, Cara had found out our flight was overbooked and we were flying on standby, so we decided to bail out a day early and come back to the UK. We took a taxi to Changi airport and spent the next 3 hours sat on our arses waiting to find out if we would get on the flight to Frankfurt. We did, and the kind people at the check-in waited until 20 minutes before take-off to issue our tickets, so we almost had to run all the way to the plane. By the way, our final baggage check-in came in at a whopping 50 kgs (we left home with 32). So our extended trip slumming it around southeast Asia ended in a couple of Business class seats to Germany. Cara flattened her bed and went to sleep, I helped myself to the airline's supply of shiraz and watched some seriously cheesy movies until the early hours. I woke up an hour before landing with a very ropey hangover and a rather fetching red wine crust around my mouth. I don't think the business lady next to me appreciated waking up next to the creature from the black lagoon, but there you go. After a few hours waiting in Frankfurt we were off again and soon we were coming in to land at Manchester. It was raining. And cold. This was England alright !

Kuala Lumpur : Big, shiny and very expensive !

We spent a few days in the Malaysian capital and one day I might even write something about it. Right now, I really can't be bothered.

Travelling in Asia : The Rules

1. There will not be enough legroom. It is irrelevant whether you travel by car, truck, bus, boat or plane. You can buy the super-duper, top of the range VIP bus ticket, and also buy the seat in front of you and rip it out. It doesn't make any difference. There will not be enough legroom.

2. Drivers of public transport are only permitted to overtake on blind corners. There are no exception to this rule.

3. Always drive slowly on straight, empty roads.

4. Always drive quickly on narrow mountain roads. The large number of hairpin turns make for plenty of overtaking opportunities.

5. Never believe a timetable. Ever.

6. Immediately after your plane has landed and a cabin attendant has asked you to remain in your seat and refrain from switching on your mobile phones, switch on your mobile phone and get up out of your seat.

7. Toilets on trains are there solely for the purpose of creating new strains of chemical and biological weapons.

8. Q : What's the difference between a pedestrian and a chicken ?
A : A truck driver will slow down to avoid a chicken.

9. If a travel agent says to you 'Yes, of course.' then the answer to your question was 'no'.

10. Climate control is intended to be very ambiguous. If your air-conditioning makes your room 3 degrees hotter than it is outside, technically it has controlled your environment.

11. Everything interesting starts at 6 O'clock in the morning.

12. If you cannot understand what is written on your menu, never pick a dish at random. It will undoubtedly contain some variety of animal genitalia or the itestinal tract of a strange looking animal you've never seen before. Mimes and hand signals are rarely more successful.

13. Dishonest men become taxi drivers. This rule is universal.

14. 73.2% of the world's 7-11 shops can be found within a 9 block radius of central Bangkok.

15. Mosquitoes are for wimps. If you hear a high pitched buzzing noise in your room and awake in the morning to find a small red lump which will cause some mild irritation for a few days, you have been bitten by a mosquito. If you hear, see and feel absolutely nothing and awake in the morning to find and enormous red mound on your skin which will ooze and seep for a week and itch so bad you will happily take a rusty cheesegrater to it if you thought it would do any good, then you have been visited by Mr. Sandfly.

16. If you take every piece of information in your guidebook and believe the exact opposite, this will most accurately describe your experiences.

17. White, plastic patio chairs are what the word ''ubiquitous" was invented for.

18. Practice your look of abject fear. A tuk-tuk driver will be personally offended if you don't look like you fear for your life, and he will be obliged to drive faster and faster until he feels you do .

19. Remember in the Roadrunner cartoons when Wile E. Coyote's plan backfires and he shoots himself with a shotgun ? When he tries to drink a glass of water it spurts out of him through all the holes. That's what it feels like to sweat in Asia.

20. You can buy 13 new T-shirts, a sarong, a vest with the words 'SAME SAME' written on the front of it and several pairs of silly fisherman's pants for what Millets charge for that one Berghaus travel shirt. Your choice !

21. The heaviest items in your pack will get used least often

Mik

Perhentian Islands : Where are all the bloody turtles ?

The Perhentian Islands,

off the northeast coast of Malaysia

Unfortunately once we had arrived on these highly recommended islands the stress of our 2 day journey didn't evaporate. We were the last people to arrive on the larger of the 2 islands, it was late and there wasn't much accomodation to chose from. The room prices were high compared to Thailand so we had to take a very basic hut for 15 quid, bit of a jump from 3 quid a night for essentially the same thing, except in this one the drainage pipe from the sink ended 2 inches from the floor. This meant that every time you cleaned your teeth you ended up with spittle on your toes - nice, minty.

We stayed there 2 nights established that we really were now fully fledged backpackers and moved to the smaller of the islands, also known as the less posh one! We had wandered the coastline of the larger islands and had come across a few beautiful bays complete with very exclusive resorts. But when the man behind reception doesn't even consult his book before telling you they have no rooms, you begin to wonder if you have taken on the backpacker look, even in your bikini!

We took a boat across to the other island, probably 100 meters away, and checked out Long Beach - the mecca of backpackers in the area. They were right, we were wrong and we moved there the following day. We were lucky though. This was probably the busiest time of the year, August and just before the weekend of Malaysian Independence Day - clever! We took what we could get and lucked out. A half decent hut complete with wardrobe, not that we used it - old habits die hard. Dinner was included in the price, we of course automatically assumed it would be rubbish, we were wrong. We even heard reports that our restaurant was where people went if they wanted a nice meal on this beach - result. We ate there every night!

The people we met also raved about the diving on the Perhentians, so we of course tried it out. Visibility was much better than in Koh Tao, and there were promises of turtles - which I personaly would be far more excited about seeing than a shark (and infinately less scared!) We had six fantastic dives, on one we were alone with our guide and as soon as we went under were surrounded by huge bumphead parrotfish. These are usually brightly coloured smaller fish which go around eating the coral and crunching on it so you can hear them. All 35 of these though were massive and we just floated for about 15 minutes watching them eat, and poo. So essentially floating in bumphead parrotfish sh*t! It was an amazing site, even the guide was really excited. But despite this once in a lifetime experience I was still gutted not to have seen a single turtle. I did however see my first shark. OK so it was only a small bamboo shark asleep under a rock, but a shark nontheless.

Aside from the diving we really did very little. Lazing on the beach and eating filled our days. We didn't even have a drink. The islands being Muslim meant that alcohol wasn't readily available. So we had 5 whole nights without a single beer, quite possibliy the longest Mik has gone without alcohol since he was 13! We heard rumours there was going to be a big party for Independence Day and as we saw crates of beer being smuggled into the restaurants we figured they were going to go for it big style. And they did. We found a shack selling half bottles of vodka for 4 quid sat back and watched the party take off. They had live bands (I use this term loosely), fire eaters, games and fireworks. The locals also had their fair share of beer and the next day many were incapacitated. I'd like to be able to tell you that we faired better, but we didn't. The 4am finish (after having to put Mik to bed) meant we didn't wake until midday and even that felt too early. Too hot to sunbathe so we ate! No pizza though - the pizza chef was still in bed with his hangover!

Having learned our lessons the hard way, we decided to be a bit more independent about our journey to the country's capital, Kuala Lumpur (KL). We booked the boat and got ourselves a cheap flight from the mainland to the capital. Boat left on time, had to wait a few minutes the other end for a taxi but he then took us to the town of Kota Buru where we would catch our flight. We had some time to kill though so unsurprisingly decided to go for dinner! We went to a canteen style chinese restaurant and had one of the best meals we'd had in a while. Oh and Mik spotted the bottles of guiness and had a large one, at 8% alcohol this meant he was a bit tipsy by the time we got on our flight!

Arrived in KL, it was nearly midnight so we caught a cab - for 10 quid - ouch. Arrived at our 3* business hotel which I thought had been overindulgent to say the least and spent the first 20 mins in our room cooing over the freebie toiletries, the mini-bar, the curtains and 24hr electricity! It suddenly struck home just how basic our acomdation had been up until that point and we loved every minute of our short stay in this fancy hotel with pool and free American buffet breakfast. Reminded by the beef bacon and chicken sausages that it still wasn't quite like home!